The Florida Panthers exploded for five goals in the third period to power past the Carolina Hurricanes 6-2 in Game 3 at Amerant Bank Arena, putting the surging Cats on the precipice of a third straight trip to the Stanley Cup Final.
Shortly after Pyotr Kochetkov robbed Carter Verhaeghe with a fabulous stick save, Niko Mikkola opened the scoring by taking a cross from Aleksander Barkov and backhanding a return pass into the crease that bounced in off of defenseman Dmitry Orlov with 7:53 left in the first period. The secondary assist on the greasy goal went to Evan Rodrigues.
The Hurricanes played one of their better periods of the series and tied the tilt 14:51 into the second when Logan Stankoven chipped the rebound of Brent Burns’ drive over Sergei Bobrovksy pad with Gustav Forsling off for delaying the game. Jesper Kotkaniemi drew the second assist for feeding Burns at right point.
A spectacular goal by super sub Jesper Boqvist at 1:29 of the third triggered a devastating five-goal outburst that spanned just 9:08 of game play.
Aaron Ekblad intercepted Taylor Hall’s pass at center ice and pushed it forward to Rodrigues, who brushed it over Boqvist. The speedy Swede gained the zone, turned Orlov inside out and lit the lamp with a fine backhand finish between Kochetkov’s pads.
The Cats would add another at 6:26 after Verhaeghe made a heady play to allow his club to smoothly exit the zone, triggering a 3-on-2 brush. Matthew Tkachuk accepted Verhaeghe’s bank pass of the boards and handed off to Sam Bennett, who held up after crossing the blue line and then found Mikkola in open space on the left side. Mikkola snapped a shot over Kochetkov’s glove from the faceoff dot to put the Panthers up by two. A very similar goal to the one he scored in Game 5 against Toronto.
Barkov would pot his first of two consecutive tallies 29 seconds later to grow the lead. Again, the Panthers took advantage of Orlov, who gagged the puck up to Tkachuk. Tkachuk centered off the boards to the incoming Barkov and he burst past Orlov and beat Kochetkov from the lower right circle.
Barkov gathered the puck after Boqvist got a piece of Scott Morrow’s clearing attempt and tried to set up Rodrigues back door for his first of the playoffs. It didn’t work out for Rodrigues, but the Panthers got their fifth goal anyways after Shayne Gostisbehere deflected Barkov’s crisp pass into his own net at the 9:31 mark.
Boqvist would collect his third point of the night 66 seconds later when his outlet pass triggered a 2-on-1 break for Anton Lundell and Brad Marchand. After failing to convert in the second period, the duo got it right this time, with Marchand taking in Lundell’s cross and roofing his shot to put the exclamation point on Florida’s torrid run of markers.
Carolina would notch a pretty, but meaningless power-play goal at 11:01 that saw Sebastian Aho nudge the puck off the boards to Stankoven, who centered to Seth Jarvis for the backhand finish from in close. Way too little. Way too late.
No Reinhart, no problem. After a big performance filling in for Rodrigues in Game 5 versus the Maple Leafs, Boqvist did it again, finishing with a playoff career-high three points. Braces from Mikkola and Barkov, who added an assist, kept the good times going offensively as the Panthers became just the third team in the last three decades to score five or more goals in four consecutive postseason games. Rod Brind’Amour’s turned to Kochetkov for a spark and it worked for forty minutes as the young stopped 14 of 15 shots, but Florida’s gale force barrage in third has the dissipating Hurricanes on the brink of elimination.
Category Five
- He left the game after crashing into the boards in the third, but Niko Mikkola had already done enough to earn the nod for First Star by turning in his first-ever two-goal performance in the Stanley Cup playoffs. It was Mikkola’s first postseason game-winner. He had an assist in each of the first two games of this series.
- Second Star Aleksander Barkov’s three-point night allowed him to take the club lead in scoring with 15 points. Barkov won 56.3% of his faceoffs and was credited with three shots and two blocks.
- After collecting just one helper (with Boston) in his first 21 playoff games, Jesper Boqvist has racked up three goals and two assists in his last three appearances.
- Evan Rodrigues has registered two assists in all three games against Carolina. He is tied with Matthew Tkachuk, who had two last night, for the team lead in helpers with ten.
- Logan Stankoven was the best Hurricane, finishing with a goal and an assist, and matching Shayne Gostisbehere with a team-high four shots.
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